Boot camp reflection

In today's bootcamp how did you do? What did you do good and what did you do bad

At today's bootcamp, there were defiantly some things that were good and bad. For the very first 10-20 minutes I thought we started off rather slow and did not have much communication, but I felt that we kept our space relatively clean. However, this did not last long. We warmed up slowly to the speed and bustle of the kitchen, but when we finally got into the groove of things, our communication and speed of working. We improved on those two, but unfortunately did not keep our organization up to par. I think we were all so caught up in the moment, we forgot to clean up after ourselves.

One of the things that I thought I did well was following the directions and cutting everything well. I was the head prep person, so I cut most of the vegetables and herbs. This meant I had to know the right was, and how much to cut each ingredient. Being able to do so may not see. Like much, but it it is actually one of the most important jobs in the kitchen. The prep must cut and measure everything out for the dish. If the prep does anything wrong down the line, like cutting up vegetables too big or too small, the dish will be ruined. Also, if they cut too much of a ingredient up, or use the wrong ingredient, it will ruin the whole dish.

During the cooking lesson, I understood that I also made some costly mistakes during our boot camp. One of the things I did wrong was I did not go above and beyond the duties of my job. As the prep, all your really told to do is cut things. And that will definitely not take up 2 and a half hours. Many times I was sitting around, not really doing much. What I should have been doing was looking for things that I could do that would help my group out in the long run.        

MPX humanities cook off rubric reflection

Looking through the rubric, there are defiantly things we need to work on, and also things that we are relatively doing well. Some things we are doing well are keeping our space sanitized, and being able to finish all of our dishes on time. For sanitation, we have the perfect person for the job. Leo always makes sure that any dishes that we use are washed, and that everything is neatly organized. Moreover, we all as a group take special care to make sure there is no food left on any of the tables, and that we keep everything in an orderly fashion. Personally, I made sure that there was no cross contamination from any of the knifes, and made sure that I washed my hands after touching non food surfaces or food in general.

Some things that I think I need to work on are reading the directions and food measurements to help with serving Methods. By doing this I can help cut Dow the time it takes us to make the food, which  in turn will help us with our overall presentation grade. Another thing that I could defiantly improve on is my pan frying. This would help with the the presentation, and make the whole experience a little more smoothly sailing. Overall, getting better at my pan frying would help the whole group work better, incase I am the only one for some reason that has to do pan frying, I can.

In preparation for the April cook off, I will be helping my parents cook, and sometimes be cooking dinner by my self. Looking for ways to improve our dish is a must, and also tasting all of the spices and the herbs that I can.      

2-1-14 video notes MPX STEM

While watching the meiosis video, I learned very important pieces of information that would help my partner and I's infographic. The first thing that I learned was that meiosis is what keeps humans from literally being clones of their parents. It also keeps adapting and natural selection alive. Meiosis makes sure that the DNA of both the mother and the father, as well as the other DNA in the cell, are always mixing and trading information. With out meiosis, we would stay the same forever, and never be able to adapt if we need to. Natural selection has been working since the beginning of time, all thanks to meiosis.

Another thing I learned about meiosis is that the only difference between mitosis and meiosis is that meiosis goes through the same process as mitosis, but twice. Doing this makes sure that the DNA has enough differences, to keep it from making the person have the exact same traits as their parents. The second phase of meiosis is literally putting a II after the name of the Phase. They didn't need to call it anything different because the second phase is the exact same thing as the first phase. Going through two phases to expand the possibilities of DNA combinations is what makes meiosis so fascinating.

Finally, I learned that because meiosis is practically mitosis, only twice, the outcome ends with four cells, not only two. Meiosis goes through the mitosis phases twice, and because at the end of mitosis you end up with two cells, meiosis leaves you with four. Because of this, the possibilities of variety in the cells are twice as much as mitosis, which keeps the process of natural selection and adaptability alive. There are four cells produces from meiosis, and there is always one dominant cell. This dominant cell is the only one useful, and will be the one that creates the human.

1-31-14 humanities food blog

While cooking the cous cous, I came across some  problems with the recipe. First off, some of the directions were a little hard to understand, so I had to read over the directions a couple of times before I started cooking. Also, the quantities for the salt were way too much than should have been in it. Poky gut feelin told me that the amount of salt that was put into the dish was not the right amount. I should have went with my gut feeling and put in the amount I thought it was.  Other than that, the recipe went pretty well. The cous cous I used for the recipe was a little different than the cous cous we used at KCC, but it still tasted the same. When I was cooking the vegetables, I used a lower hear, is the vegetables would not be as crisp on the outside, and more overall cooked. Also, I noticed that the vegetables weren't as oily as when we cooked it at KCC. Because we were cooking at home, the dish came out a little different than as when we did it at KCC.

As for the dressing, I chose to do the vinaigrette. This also came out a little different than when we did it at KCC. I used regular, pre-diced garlic instead if cutting up fresh garlic. As for the granola, I used Hawaiian granola, which is pretty much granola with a little added seeds and nuts. One thing that was really weird about the dressing was the next day there was almost whip cream like foam sitting on the top of the dressing from shaking it up so much the day before. The dressing that I took home from KCC didn't do that. I think that its because I used a different ingredient than the actual recipe said to use.

All in all, the two dishes I chose to do went pretty smoothly. the cous cous, despite it being very salty at first, was pretty good when i finished it, because I put sugar in it to calm down the salty flavor. As for the dressing, everything went pretty well.